House Republicans led by Speaker John Boehner are working to overturn the ban that was passed in 2007, by a Democrat Congress, on incandescent light bulbs. Many people are unaware that the ban begins on January 1, 2012, when 100-watt bulbs are outlawed.

A key House committee staffer emailed today that “It looks like light bulbs are one of the final sticking points on the Omnibus Appropriations bill that would block the light bulb ban from taking effect.

The replacements available for the standard lightbulb include two versions of bulbs that are not really ready for prime time — the twisty compact fluorescent with its eye irritation, slow warm-up and generally bad light, or the LED bulb which has baffles to attempt to get it to spread its light in the right direction. The ban was instituted at the behest of the major bulb-making companies, GE, Sylvania and Phillips, who found they could make way more money on CFL bulbs made in China, and claim energy savings as the rationale. With the exposure of the global warming fraud, this is a little hard to swallow. The lost jobs when the U.S. bulb factories were closed are just more additions to the long list of jobs lost because of Obama administration regulation.

Even better, is a phone call. The Capitol Switchboard number is (202) 225-3121. A live operator will direct you to the right offices if you give them your State and zip-code. Your representatives are more impressed if you make the effort to phone — it tells them that you’re serious.

First, just to put this straight: it is hard to dispute the concluding statement:

Defenders of the light bulb ban claim people are better off with alternatives to incandescents, but if the public agreed, Congress wouldn’t need a ban to get the public to switch.

Now a few nuances.

I am not a fan of CFLs. What I’d like to see, though, are some figures that could answer the question: Which releases more mercury into the environment: that from broken or improperly recycled CFLs, or that from burning the extra coal to generate electricity for the less efficient incandescent bulbs?

“Most alternatives use less energy, some substantially less.” That is indeed the case. But, of course, that should be an adequate selling point, and not require government intervention. The bulb sellers have not been very good at providing consumers with the savings figures. Perhaps that’s because they are afraid of lawsuits if the bulbs don’t last for as long as claimed?

If consumers’ desire is to save money on their power bill, they can use any damn bulbs they want. It is not an area where Congress is free to regulate. Ditto: bathrooms, showers, toilets, Smart Meters, kitchens. Constitutional limits. Leftist Control Freaks. From the Wall Street Journal regarding the EPA’s new Utility rule:

“Keep in mind that the EPA estimates that the benefits to society from the mercury reductions in the utility rule max out at $6.1 million, total, while imposing $11 billion in compliance costs annually. That is a crazy tradeoff even if it didn’t endanger the electric grid.”

Re “which is worse”
incandescent related extra coal mercury emissions or CFL mercury
This is a bit of a red herring – 2 wrongs don’t make a right.

That said, ban proponents use old mercury emission data
– just like they use old CO2 emissions data,
PROJECT that forward to 2030,
and then talk of multi-million ton savings

As Elephant Child says,
EPA have already put in place mandates, 90% mercury emission mandates, on coal power plants,
as vigorously pursued by new admin Lisa Jackson (there was a court case challenge).
So whether you think that’s good or bad,
it knock s the “bad incandescent” argument,
certainly on those future projections.

I don’t really understand about mercury. When I was a kid, all of the kids had great fun playing with the mercury from broken thermometers. If we assume, as I believe to be fact, that 1). global warming and cooling are simply natural to a constantly changing climate 2). that the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere is very low, and historically has been much higher 3). we actually have a plentiful supply of energy –good for at least 250 years without any further discoveries or technologies — then what is the vast urgency of saving small amounts of energy? I am always tempted to suggest sending your broken CFL bulbs to Congress, but that would undoubtedly get me in trouble.

EC, Yes there used to be fun hand held toy labyrinth games too were you had guide a mercury blob from start to finish – before computers😉 That would probably cause an environmental parental revolution upset these days to see such toys.
Apparently mercury affects the brain, which some of my acquiantances might say “that explains a lot”.

There is a mania for saving energy and to enforce it
Advice for saving fine, enforcing no.
Even if there was a shortage, the price rise limits use anyway!!!
Gas for cars too – price goes up,, people buy fuel savers.
Simple.
No need to legislate for it.
Unless you want to give the makers of Green expensive often Patented products nice kickback profits
After all , much easier big market-share at the stroke of a pen,
than to actually have to try to sell something against cheaper alternatives 😉

Bulb Ban postponement announced to Sep 30 2012
Passed in House 2 hours ago.
Passage in Senate seen as a formality.

Light bulb ban postponement was the only Republican amendment to the Energy funding Bill allowed by Pres Obama’s office in last night’s discussions…. which is seen as a sign that the change may become permanent, especially in 2012 election year

This is a little more than confusing. I get the postponement, the denial of funding of oversight I don’t quite get. But haven’t all the lightbulb factories been shut down? Will there be bulbs available? We don’t use 100s much anyway. 60s and 75s we use a lot. The reading lamps all get 3-ways. They did, however, pass the bill without any tax increase, which is good. For all the talk about bulbs, no one has been talking about all the other kind of bulbs — appliance bulbs, nightlight bulbs, spotlights and floodlights (we use a lot of those), track light halogen bulbs. There are no replacements!
The postponement of the Keystone XL is more understandable. Obama has to decide in 60 days. Whatever he does, he’s on record as either screwing the enviros or screwing the unemployed. No wonder he wanted to escape deciding.